Dennis J. Bernstein

Holy

is the word
for his sax
when he
holds it up
to his lips
and starts
blowing
kisses
to god.

(after coltrane, a love supreme)

Bio

Dennis J Bernstein is author, most recently, of Special Ed: Voices from a Hidden Classroom,
which received the 2012 Literary Achievement Award from Artist Embassy International. His poetry
has appeared in the New York Quarterly, Chimaera, Bat City Review, The Progressive,
Texas Observer, ZYZZYVA, Red River Review, etc. Alice
Walker, Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Color Purple, writes that Special Ed "…is art turned
to us through the eyes of love." Carol Smaldino says in The Huffington Post
that the poems remind us how "…we are all connected to the sorrows as well as to
the grandness of being human…"Bernstein, who holds a master's degree in Education,
has also taught media literacy and special education, working in some of the poorest
communities in New York City and New York State. He has also taught writing and reading
literacy in various prisons in New York City and New York State, for the CCNY/John Jay
College and Mercy College.